


"I'm Sorry."

by PandaWritesPoorly



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Exhaustion, Fainting, Gen, Hiding sickness, Hurt/Comfort, Not Proofread, One Shot, Overworking, Sick Character, They Know Their Identities, they're in college
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-28
Updated: 2020-01-28
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:55:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22449037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PandaWritesPoorly/pseuds/PandaWritesPoorly
Summary: Marinette is sick, but she's very good at hiding it - until she's not.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 24
Kudos: 303





	"I'm Sorry."

**Author's Note:**

> Look, you know what to expect from me at this point. I'm pretty sure it's clear I'm a sucker for hurt/comfort. Here's some more of my usual 'hurt Mari and have Chat deal with the aftermath'.  
> I have been working on With Time, but I just couldn't keep hurting my sunshine boy. I legitimately made myself cry a little and I had to take a break.

One step. One step. One step.

Marinette repeats that over in her head. Just one step. She knows she’s sick, but she’s not  _ that _ sick. She really shouldn’t miss anymore school anyways.

Heroes don’t take sick days.

Or weeks, seeing as she’s been feeling absolutely disgusting for…

Two weeks? Is that right?

Her head is pulsing, her ears seem like they’re stuffed in cotton, she can’t really breathe through her nose, her eyes are scratchy and would probably be slightly red.

Key word:  _ ‘would’. _

Ladybug can heal. So, Marinette does that. The moment she wakes up, she heals herself superficially. Sure, it adds a whole extra layer to her exhaustion - some bone-deep feeling of energy lost, but it’s fine. No one has noticed she’s sick because she’s been careful to not let it show.

It slips through a little. In her increased clumsiness for the most part. She’s got all sorts of bruises and scratches.

She’ll be able to rest eventually. Once all of her responsibilities are completed, she can take a nap or something. Maybe let on that she’s sort of sick.

One step. One step. Careful, here’s the stairs.

Up once. Up once. Keep going until you’ve reached the top. One more. There you go, at the top now. 

Eventually, she makes it to class. Taking a seat and getting out her supplies as usual, she prepares to try her best (and fail) to pay attention to her professor.

* * *

Marinette is in her room, trying to work on her homework. She can’t remember anything from class as usual, but that’s what Google is for.

Just look up how to do it, and do the question. Rinse and repeat.

“Marinette?” Tikki asks, “Are you alright? You seem a little sluggish today.”

Tikki. Tikki has been on to her for a while now.

“I’m fine, just a little tired,” Marinette admits. It’s the truth, if a bit under-exaggerated.

Tikki hums, “Maybe you should take a nap.”

Marinette’s phone dings before she can respond. “Akuma. No time.”

Tikki frowns as Marinette transforms. Ladybug sighs, this isn’t good. Tikki is suspicious, and she knows her boyfriend well enough that Adrien is definitely aware that something is off. He’ll definitely be keeping an eye on her during the attack.

She shivers a little, her fever getting to her.

No, none of that now.  _ Ladybug doesn’t get sick. _

Exiting from the balcony of their shared apartment, she swings off in the direction of the akuma.

Just six more hours, then she can go to bed. She’s found that with five hours she can still maintain her work while seeming well-rested. It’s her favorite five hours of the day.

Goodness, her ears are ringing. She’s probably getting worse.

Chat shows up beside her, and she pulls up her usual attitude for when she’s heroing.

This is normal. She’s normal. She’s- oh great, wow, everything’s spinning.

Blinking a few times, everything shifts back to normal, if maybe a little out of focus. Healing herself in the suit is out of the question - Tikki would know what she did.

She’d probably force an early detransformation to get her to rest. Maybe tell Chat.

Ladybug is no match for their combined forces in her current state.

* * *

“Another successful battle!” Chat grins, “We do good work m’lady.”

She smiles, holding out her fist. “Pound it!”

As she returns her arm to her side, she feels her exhaustion rise within her. Everything at once. What- oh.

Her last class had run longer, she’d forgotten to heal herself afterwards. There’s no ignoring how utterly  _ awful _ she feels.

She puts her hand out, gently touching her partner’s arm to catch his attention.

He turns to her, “Yeah, Bug?”

Fever pulsing in her head, ears ringing, world spinning. She’s a whole ‘nother level of fatigued. The healing takes a lot more out of her than she thought. This is debilitating.

Drawing a shaky breath, she murmurs, “I’m sorry.”

She gives in, ending her fight and collapsing.

Her eyes roll back in her head before fluttering closed. Ladybug’s limp body pitches forward. She collapses against Chat’s chest, slipping down.

Her partner catches her under her arms before she can go much further.

* * *

Voices slur together in her mind. What’s going on?   
Marinette is awake, but she doesn’t open her eyes. She needs to figure out what’s going on first.

She can still hear the voices, there’s a conversation going on, but she can’t really register the words or meanings.

She tries to shift herself slightly, so as to perhaps better understand. She groans softly, and the voices stop.

“Mari? Are you up?”

It’s just noise to her. Meaningless sound. Frustrated, she opens her eyes to try and better understand what’s going on.

Everything is vaguely blurry, and while there’s clearly shapes that she should recognize, her brain can’t connect the dots. She whines softly, her body finally registering how it feels.

Every part of her feels like a truckload of bricks. She’s barely been awake for a minute, but she’s entirely spent.

Something brushes her hair out of her face gently. “Shhh. It’s alright. You can go back to sleep, love.”

That seems nice.

* * *

Marinette is awake again, and she finally remembers herself enough to know that there’s a schedule she’s supposed to be keeping to. Struggling to sit up properly, she finds the clock.

The time displayed is about 15 minutes past when she’d usually start getting ready. Alright, so she’s not  _ too _ behind.

Shuffling into the kitchen, she sees her boyfriend sitting at the table. That’s odd, he’s usually sleeping still.

“A’rien?”

His attention snaps to her immediately. “Mari! You’re up!” his excited whisper remains mindful of the headache she didn’t realize she had.

“Yeah?” she murmurs, wiping the sleep from her eyes with the heel of her hand.

He hums, stepping closer to look over her closer. Pressing a hand to her forehead to check her temperature, he frowns.

“You’re definitely a little warm still.”

“‘t’s fine, gotta’ get ready…”

He chuckles wryly, “It’s pm, not am. You’re about 12 hours off, dear.”

She knows she should have a response, this should be startling, or mean something, but she doesn’t really care.

He’s so  _ warm. _ She leans against him, humming softly in response to his statement.

“Still tired?” he says as he puts a hand on her head, hugging her against him lightly with the other.

“Hmmm…”

Adrien shakes his head, “Alright, off to bed with you then.”

Marinette can’t find it in herself to argue. She feels him shift as he scoops her up, and she leans against him, glad she doesn’t have to walk back to the bed.

“At least you’re up, you’ve been out for… this is the third day now? Yeah. You’ve been waking up every so often, but you haven’t been all there,” he informs her as he places her into the bed again.

She blinks at him sleepily, and he smiles softly, “Shhh, you sleep now. I can reprimand you for overworking yourself later.”

She mumbles nothing in particular as he pulls the blanket around her. She registers him giving her a soft kiss on her forehead before she surrenders to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Babies.  
> I'm on [tumblr](https://pandawritespoorly.tumblr.com/)! Thanks for reading! Feel free to leave any thoughts, theories, constructive criticism, or anything really in the comments below! I love getting that notification!


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